Proper 10, Year B | Ephesians 1:3-14
St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church
July 14, 2024
the Rev. Jonathan Hanneman
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This is one of those weeks where we once again have WAY too many things that need some explanation pretty much smeared throughout all our texts.
First of all, we need to take a quick dip into the ancient world’s understanding of and behaviors toward women. When it comes down to it, both in Ancient Israel and during the Roman Empire, women were—from a modern viewpoint—more or less property. They had varying rights in different eras, but the “property” aspect always remains, to some extent. Our Hebrew Bible reading today mentions Michal without actually having introduced her to us at more critical junctures in the story, making her appear to be some sort of “bad” or bitter wife to David. So for some background, Michal was King Saul’s daughter. When David joined the royal retinue, she fell in love with him. Saul saw this as an opportunity to either get rid of David or to manipulate him, so when David survived the quest Saul set for Michal’s hand, Saul married her to him. Later, when Saul begins active assassination attempts against David, Michal helps David escape the palace. She excuses herself to her father by saying that David threatened to kill her.
A key point here is to realize that women ALWAYS remained the property of their father and his heirs. A powerful enough father[1]—like a king—could end any of his daughters’ marriages at pretty much any time. So with David out of the picture, Saul reclaims his property—Michal—and marries her off to a different man. Later during the war of succession between David and the last remaining members of Saul’s house, one of David’s terms of peace was that Michal be returned to him. So her brother Ishbaal took her from her husband and gave her back to David.
I don’t recall the Bible ever telling us that David loved Michal, but it does explicitly state that Michal’s second husband did indeed love her. My guess is that, with her second husband, Michal actually began to understand what real love could look like, so being forcibly traded back to a previous husband—who already had plenty of other wives—likely introduced some resentment. When Michal later rebukes David for having exposed himself to all the women of Israel while he was dancing in front of the ark in this morning’s reading, David punishes her by exiling her from the royal chambers, never allowing her a child that might someday care for her in her biological family’s stead.
So when people want to make arguments about “biblical” marriage, remember what that fully means. Marriage—in both Hebrew society and ancient Rome—was a legal contract (a sort of long-term rental, really) strictly between a father and a son-in-law, one which the father did have authority to revoke. If that sounds offensive to you, that’s because it should, as, through the influence of Christianity, our understanding of human personhood has developed far beyond the limits of that way of thinking over the last few millennia.
The other women in today’s Gospel reading also receive less-than-positive portrayals. Books, plays, and movies about this scene always show Herodias’ daughter as a sex object, essentially seducing her stepfather to forward her mother’s evil plans. That interpretation is more a display of our own Western depravity than the reality of the girl’s actions. Dance, in Eastern cultures, is often a very formal affair, involving subtle movements and stances that are meant to present a story. My guess is that the girl pulled off a such remarkable and delicate performance of one of their traditional pieces that Herod was genuinely impressed with her skill. Additionally, we need to recognize his execution of John was not the girl’s fault. Nor is it technically Herodias’ fault either. The responsibility lies squarely on Herod, who preferred to act against his own moral compulsions rather losing face in front of some people he wanted to impress.
Having talked about ancient marriage this morning, there’s another social practice we need to discuss if we hope to fully understand what Paul is talking about in Ephesians:[2] adoption.
Adoption in the ancient world was similar to adoption today in that it involved a formal, legal restructuring of a family. However, it was utterly unlike modern adoption in most other ways we would consider to be important. Roman adoption rarely involved a minor.[3] It was primarily a legal agreement between two adult men wherein one would formally declare the other to be his chosen heir. The adoptee became a member of the “father’s” household, taking on the family name and identity and training in the heir’s standard expectations of managing and maintaining the family’s wealth and religious traditions for future generations.
This sometimes happened even if the father had biological children. In such cases, the father would generally “emancipate”[4] his biological children at the same time so the adoption would clearly take legal precedent over any genetic heritage. In exchange for adoption, the adoptee gave up nearly all his individual rights, becoming the equivalent of what we would understand to be a legal minor, no matter his age, until his adopted father’s death. At that point the adoptee became the head of the family—the father—and the full owner of all family property.
So when Paul says God “destined us for adoption”[5] or applies that imagery elsewhere, there are a few things we need to keep in mind.
The first thing to note here is that God does not follow the cultural norm for Roman fathers, who would select a single heir to maintain and represent the family, legally setting aside or even cutting off other children so there was no challenge to the heir’s authority. God instead adopts many “children.” God continues to adopt more and more “children.” God isn’t at all concerned with maintaining power and authority or ensuring the future of the family through some sort of inscrutable succession plan. God doesn’t worry about running out of resources or diluting our inheritance down to nothing. God keeps giving and keeps adopting. God keeps loving and supporting and serving beyond all sensible limits.
Secondly, the adoption Paul talks about was always a two-way street. Like modern adoption, the parent (father) took on the responsibility of caring for, guiding, and preparing the “child” for independence. Unlike the adoption we know, however, the (adult) “child” also took on responsibilities, committing themself not simply to become like the father but, from our vantage, to pretty much become the father! They weren’t simply to reflect his actions, attitudes, and commitments in their own individual way; they needed to learn exactly who the father was—how he thought and behaved, his intentions and goals, his full way of being—and then to function as an extension of that very existence in the world around them.[6]
Early Church theologians had a concept called “theosis”—often translated as “being made” or even “turning into” God, an idea which can sound almost offensively presumptive to our ears. But I suspect they understood this “becoming God” to be a process similar to the responsibilities that fell upon an adopted person. Having been brought into God’s family,[7] they knew to train themselves to walk in God’s ways; to respond with God’s actions, attitudes, and commitments; to live as God, exemplified in Jesus Christ, lived.[8] Being adopted into the Christian family was a commitment to becoming who the Lord claimed to be: “merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for the thousandth generation, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin.”[9] The goal wouldn’t have been so much to “turn into God” as to become the embodiment of the one who “makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous”[10]—to make God’s presence physical and tangible to friend and enemy alike.
So then, what about us? Are we content to just learn or talk about God? Are we satisfied with simply learning to think the “right” things about God? Or are we willing to “adopt” the responsibilities of a genuine heir? Are we willing to watch, train, and study God’s actions and behaviors? Are we willing to look at the details of who God is, to search for answers to questions of how God thinks—to practice God’s own movements and pick up God’s own accent and embrace God’s own attitudes? God has “destined us for adoption as his children.” Are we willing to undergo the work necessary to become worthy and honorable heirs?
[1] Or a surviving brother
[2] And other epistles
[3] Someone with unformed character presented too much of a risk to the family’s future needs.
[4] Which, for us, looks more like disowning or writing out of the will
[5] Ephesians 1:5 | All Bible quotations are from the NRSV unless otherwise noted.
[6] It was the same with students and teachers. Good disciples wouldn’t have expected to surpass their masters but to become just like them—to maintain their teachings and traditions throughout time.
[7] And made official representatives of that family
[8] and lives
[9] Exodus 34:6-7
[10] Matthew 5:45